WHEN AND WHERE:
27-29 September 2017
Monterotondo (RM)
TARGET AUDIENCE:
High School Students, Teachers, Researchers, Experts in Science Education and Communication
PARTICIPANTS:
10 Teachers
10 Students
The Workshop “Educate on Science: Mind Journeys” has officially launched the third edition of the Be Scientist! project.
The working group composed of 10 teachers (from Campania, Lazio and Lombardia) each accompanied by one student, participated to the Workshop held at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) Monterotondo (Rome).
As usual, the format teacher+student has been very successful, and useful to reflect on and test innovative resources for life science education.
Over 3 days, teachers and students have been involved in:
– Scientific session: The main topic (Neuroscience) has been introduced through a seminar by Ilaria Minio Paluello (Fondazione Santa Lucia and Sapienza Università di Roma) who illustrated her researches on autism and the social brain – and a seminar presented by Mariano Maffei (European Molecular Biology Laboratory – Rome) who works on somatosensory neurons and chronic pain.
– Session on teaching methodologies: introduced by an inquiry-based demonstration on the PCR technique, developed by Adamas Scienza to reflect with teachers and students about the efficacy of the most recent didactic methodologies to promote collective, critical and individual learning experiences.
– Laboratory session: Teachers and Students have been involved in planning a scientific experiment, working in groups in order to set the conditions for a PCR reaction able to identify a mutation responsible for Parkinson’s Disease. Each group has been able to test its own strategy and analysed the results in order to confirm its efficacy.
– Session on Animal Research: This delicate topic has been introduced by two separate activities aimed at teachers and students: the teachers have used an updated version of the Playdecide game, a very nice tool to debate on ethical and social implications related to many scientific topics, based on clear and rigorous information. The students have worked in groups in order to prepare posters on different aspects of Animal Research, and present them to the audience. This introductory phase has been followed by an open debate, supported by two experts (Marcello Raspa – responsible for the European Archive of Mutant Mice, EMMA – and Veronica Ghiglieri – Researcher at Fondazione Santa Lucia and Perugia University). The final presentation by Veronica Ghiglieri has presented the topic of Animal Research in the context of a research project, describing the rules applied in any animal research Institute.
On the very last day, the participants have been given the chance to visit the Campus and follow and introduction on the Behavioural Facility (given by Elisabetta Golini from the CNR-IBCN) and the Microscopy Facility (given by Giulia Bolasco from EMBL Rome).
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